The Witcher 3 – Blood and Wine – Final Boss Guide

Dettlaff

The Witcher 3 – Blood and Wine – Final Boss Guide

Beating Dettlaff the final boss in the Blood and Wine DLC for The Witcher 3.

A general note for this fight – I used only Quen sign, some food and three different potions – 1: Enhanced White Rafford’s Decoction. 2: White Honey. 3: Enhanced Swallow.

Form 1: Vampire. The initial fight is the easiest and I used Quen, held down block and then primarily used dodge, and normal or heavy attack. After Dettlaff takes about 20% damage he transforms into his next form.

Form 2: Flying Vampire Monster. Dettlaff mutates into a large flying monster that if it were real would come from a lineage of formidable breeding as it is a pretty fearsome enemy. Initially I found this the hardest fight and it took many attempts to defeat Dettlaff in this form. However, after I had learnt to deal with his attacks I actually found it relatively straight forward.

Firstly I made sure that I was locked on to him and had my Quen shield up whenever possible. (I minimised running or rolling as this reduces Quen charge).

The fight went like this, although the sequence of attacks did change around during the combat. – Dettlaff flies up into the air hovering as he gathers a large group of bats towards him. When the swarm of bats has finished gathering, they all fly towards you and can cause a lot of damage. I found the trick in dodging them was to listen out for the sound that’s made as the bats are drawn into Dettlaff. As this creates an increasingly high pitch frequency and at the moment the swarm finishes gathering, the sound stops and I take this as my queue to do a diving dodge.

(Note: I was using a PS4 controller connected via a steam box to my PC, so the timing you require for the dive maybe slightly different due to latency).

After practice I found I could dodge the bats every time without taking any damage. After this dive, Dettlaff swooped in and I did a normal dodge. This not only made me look like a boss, but it was also effective in avoiding his attack.

Once the bats and dodging his swooping attack is complete, he usually transformed into smoke and hurtled down towards me smashing into the ground. This is one of the most dangerous attacks in the whole sequence, so try to avoid at all costs.

One thing that makes this easier is that a strange type of liquid looking smoke connects with the ground just before he arrives, so this gives warning of where and when to dodge. – When he hits the ground he gets stuck for a bit and now is the time to attack. I could usually get in four good strikes, but key here is not to get greedy.

If you are late with your attacks just do one or two strikes and run away. If not you’ll take damage when he flies up into the air.

(Also watch out for this liquid like smoke as it stays on a patch on the ground, and if you run into it you will get stuck for a few seconds). After you have have gone through the above sequence several times you will get his energy low enough and this will move you on to the next and final phase of the fight.

Form 3: Three Pulsating Blood Sacs. In the final phase Dettlaff appears as a blood covered vampire monster and traps you in a flesh like dome of doom! ;D Just avoid him and don’t waste your energy attacking him. Dodge him consistently and attack the sacs. After you have destroyed the three sacs the dome will be destroyed and it takes just one final strike to finish the fight!

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